Lima Heights Adjacent
by terriblemuriel
Summary: Santana hasn't always lived on the wrong side of the tracks, but when she has a bad day she revisits the events that brought her here and what it will take to get out.


**A/N: Special thanks to Sappho's Ghost for editing and being an all-around good writing "influence". If you haven't read her stories, do it. She's amazing.**

Santana Lopez hasn't been carried since she was a child and although she struggles at first, something inside her defaults to her five-year-old self and she goes limp, knowing that she is safe in the arms of her protector. Her head is swimming after the fight and it's easier to just relax and let the halls of McKinley High close around her as she makes her journey to the nurse's office in Coach Beiste's arms. For all her size, the coach's hands are gentle as she lays Santana down on the nurse's cot.

"Got another one for you," she says to the nurse, who sighs and gives Santana a dubious look.

"Mono? There's a lot of it going around."

"Nope, this one tried to take on a girl about three times her size. Got her ass handed to her, I'd say. But she's plucky. Didn't give up. If she's fast, I could maybe use her on next year's football team."

The nurse clucks and shakes her head disapprovingly while Santana groans and covers her eyes with her hand. Yes, her head and back hurt, but she's more pained by the fact that she did, indeed, have her ass whooped by one Lauren Zizes, high school state champion in Greco-Roman wrestling.

_I don't know what the hell I was thinking!_ Santana thinks as Coach Beiste simultaneously says as she exits, "Don't know what the hell she was thinking," which causes Santana to groan even louder.

Santana doesn't know how this even started. All she wanted to do was blackmail Puck into taking her to Breadstix on Valentine's Day. (She loves those buttery breadsticks, but it's more important that everyone knows she has a date on the most romantic day of the year.) She never intended it to turn into a full out "hall brawl" with Lauren. It's not like Santana is even remotely jealous of Lauren. She has no real feelings for Puck. At best he's a distraction, but he's good for her reputation and they've been doing this on-again, off-again dance for so long it's at least familiar if not welcome. The bigger issue, Santana realizes, is that she just outed herself to not only Lauren, but also a huge crowd of onlookers, by announcing that she's from Lima Heights Adjacent. Nobody but Brittany is supposed to know where she lives. Sure, she'll pull out her zip code when she's on the streets to intimidate the girls who step to her, and it's usually enough to get them to back off, but school is a different story. At school she has an image to protect. It's bad enough that she was demoted from head cheerleader, but if everyone knows that she lives in the "slums" of Lima it will ruin her.

Santana groans again as she thinks about her bleak, miserable house in "Lima Heights Adjacent." It's not really called that, but it makes Santana laugh to think that the poverty-stricken neighborhood her own mother grew up in (and vowed never to return to) is only one half mile from the richest neighborhood in town. Lima Heights is a gated community comprised of enormous, cookie-cutter McMansions in every shade of beige, all with sweeping drives, manicured lawns and pools, and which houses the upper echelons of Lima society. Her own house, a post-war, pre-fab rambler with peeling siding, bars on the windows, a weedy overgrown yard, and cracked sidewalks is in the neighborhood where the _real_ Lima losers live. It's "adjacent" to Lima Heights which is how the realtors advertise the place when they can't think of any other redeeming values for the blighted neighborhood. _Location, Location, Location_ the FOR SALE signs scream (and there are so many FOR SALE signs these days). Yes, it is close in proximity to Lima Heights, but that's about it. Otherwise, "Lima Heights Adjacent" is as close to Lima Heights as she is to her fellow Glee club members. Which is not fucking close at all. In fact, it might as well be downtown Detroit with its air of run-down hopelessness and domestic despair.

All Santana knows, or cares, about the place is that it is a neighborhood that she is itching to escape. Like her mother did, she plans on using her skills as a Cheerio, her talent as a singer/dancer and her attractive face and body to get the holy hell out before she turns into Grace Maria Garcia Lopez; a once very attractive and talented woman who thought she'd married her way out of the ghetto, only to find herself shy of forty, divorced, a single mother, and sucked back onto the very street she'd thought she seen the last of at age 18.

Santana hasn't always lived on the wrong side of the tracks. As a child she lived just one half mile over in Lima Heights (which is a ridiculous name for the subdivision, she thinks, because it's not high at all; there is not a single natural hill to be found in the entirety of Northwestern Ohio). It's where she grew up and it's how she met Brittany, who still lives in the neighborhood. Santana likes spending all her free time at the blonde's house. It's impossibly large (for just four people), serene and immaculate. Brittany has a huge bedroom and her own private bath, which Santana envies every morning as she and her mother elbow each other for space in front of the mirror in their single bathroom. She has a walk-in closet that houses her nice clothes and a pool in the back for hosting parties for the glitterati of McKinley High. Spending time at Brittany's reminds Santana of a time when she had all those same things. A time before her mom and dad split. She was twelve years old when the nightly fights and slamming doors of one or the other of her parents leaving turned into her dad just not coming home at all. Within the year, she and her mother had packed and moved and Santana's life had drastically changed.

"_I never wanted this for you," her mother says, clutching her and sobbing into her shoulder. "I never wanted this for me. I never thought I'd find myself back here, of all the god-forsaken places. I was Miss Ohio 3__rd__ runner up for fuck's sake!" _

_Santana sits rigidly on her new second-hand single bed (her old bed is at her father's house and much too large to fit into this tiny room). She'd heard this all before. Except for the swearing. Her mother never used to swear around her, something about this house and this neighborhood brings it out of her. She gingerly wraps thin arms around her mom, knowing there is nothing she can do or say to change this moment. Instead she focuses on the faded, curling-at-the-edges wallpaper of her new room rather than the swollen, red-rimmed eyes of her mom and feels guilty that she cannot cry with her. But her tears are all gone, spent on her father. Gallons of them wasted every time he walked out of their old house saying that yes, he still loves her, but never touching her with lips or arms before he rushed out the door._

"_Promise me, San," her mother whisper-sobs into her ear. "Promise me that you won't end up back here some day like me." Her mother sits back and cups her chin, forcing their identically dark, blank eyes to meet. "And promise me you won't end up like those girls you see in the neighborhood. They're never getting off this block! And don't make the same mistakes I made. Take the scholarships. Do something with your life. Get as far away from here as you can. Do whatever it takes, mija. Understand me? Whatever it takes." _

_Santana nods, mutely. Yes, she agrees, she'll get away. Yes, she'll do whatever it takes. She will work hard and become top in everything so she can escape this place. Moreover, she vows then and there that she will do everything in her power to never have to feel the desperation her mother exudes in that moment sitting on her twelve year-old's bed in a dismal house in one of the worst areas of Lima, Ohio._

"Take this." The nurse rouses Santana, handing her an ice pack, "and these," and adds a bottle of water and a small paper cup with two white pills.

"Codeine?" Santana asks hopefully.

"Advil," the nurse answers sternly.

Santana grumbles but takes everything from the nurse, tipping the pills into her mouth and chasing them with a swig from the water bottle. She doesn't think she fell asleep but she definitely drifted off. Her head feels fuzzy and she tries shaking it but that does her no favors. Groaning, she tenderly sinks her hands into her hair on either side of her temple and rubs gently.

"My head kind of hurts." She hates admitting that Lauren may actually have damaged her, but having a doctor for a father has at least taught her that pride does not trump head injuries.

"I'm sure it does."

Santana can tell the woman is judging her. And since she's not wearing her Cheerios uniform, is probably thinking she is just another troublemaker from the projects. She wants to set the woman straight, to tell her she's not like that, that she is _somebody_ at this school and not just some juvenile delinquent. She's not Puck. She opens her mouth to give the woman a piece of her mind, but only air escapes her lips. Suddenly, she's too choked up to speak as she realizes she's exactly what the nurse thinks she is; just another poor kid from the wrong side of town with no future.

The nurse takes no notice and produces a file. "It says here that your mother and father are divorced. Which one do you want me to call to come and get you? You really should have that head examined."

"Call my dad," Santana whispers. "He's a doctor."

_Santana hates weddings. Well, she hates this wedding: her father's wedding. She is thirteen years old and she hates wearing the stiff, ugly dress and standing in her former church being stared at by her former fellow parishioners. Most of all, she hates Dawn. Dawn is a gorgeous blonde dancer who is all of 23 and about to become Santana's new stepmother. She hates Dawn for her stunning All-American good looks (tall, athletic, blonde, blue-eyed, with big boobs and curves in all the right places), for her "Imma be your cool big sister" way of treating Santana like they are the best of buds, for taking Santana's father away from her and her mom, and she especially hates her for getting to enjoy the life and the house that were formerly hers._

"_Santana, remove that scowl from your face," her father hisses. "It's time."_

_The music swells and on cue Dawn marches down the aisle accompanied by her equally stunning blonde brother. Dawn's father is "not around" is all Santana's been told. She uses her newly adopted "Lima Heights Adjacent smirk" (she's seen it on all the girls on her street) to indicate to Dawn that she does not want to "bond" over this information when it is first imparted to her. In fact, she's actively not giving a shit about Dawn or her lack of family or even this wedding with every ounce of the recently learned L.H.A. attitude she now possesses._

"_Santana, stand up straight and smile. Now." her father growls at her and she does as she is told, straightening her back and adjusting her lips, cheeks and brows into an upward semblance of the appropriate facial expression. It is not a real smile, but her father sighs and looks back to his beaming young bride-to-be instead. His dark eyes have a hard glint but he smiles winningly as Dawn approaches, his daughter forgotten at his side. She relaxes her face and her stance and stares toward the stained-glass windows instead, all the while wishing she were anywhere else but at this effing Lima Heights wedding._

The clanging bell feels like it's right next to her head when it goes off to signal the lunch break. Santana jumps up, grabs her head, groans, and sinks back down again all in the space of a few seconds. It takes her head a few more seconds to complete the journey and she feels a wave of dizziness overtake her. She closes her eyes counting to ten as she steels herself against the nausea rolling up her body. She will NOT throw up in the nurse's office.

Minutes pass as does her dizziness and Santana hears voices in the outer room. The curtain is pulled back and Santana opens her eyes to see Quinn Fabray smirking at her from the entrance. Quinn may look like the Madonna, but Santana knows she's a predator inside. This visit does not bode well.

"What do you want?" Santana growls in her best HBIC voice: two parts bitch and one part indifference. She does not want Quinn to know that she hurts.

"Heard about your smack down from Puck and Lauren. And Finn. Oh, and Sam told me too. Just came to see for myself if it was true. Did she really kick your ass all over the hallway?"

"NO!" Santana must save face. "I totally could've taken her. And I'm perfectly fine. Stupid nurse is just making me lie here til my dad comes, that's all."

"I can't believe that's the second time you've lost a fight in the halls of McKinley. Santana Lopez, former head cheerleader, beaten up by a fat chick loser. Sad. Everybody used to respect you, or at least fear you." She shakes her head mockingly. "Oh how the mighty have fallen."

"It's not the second time, I totally kicked your ass last fall. I whooped you in that fight."

"Keep telling yourself that San. As I recall, I'm not the one who ended up on the bottom of the pyramid." Quinn smirks again and Santana would give anything to rise up and strike her, to knock that holier-that-thou look off her face, but her recent bout with dizziness tells her it's not a good idea.

Not wanting to appear weak (it's a tragic mistake to make in front of one Quinn Fabray) she settles for threats instead. She hardens her eyes in that way she's been taught by the girls on her block and uses her most threatening street voice, "Bitch, don't make me get up in here and kick your fucking ass again. Cuz not even dat nurse'd stop me from taking you down." She includes a sassy hand gesture.

Quinn twists her lip and cocks her brow sarcastically but says nothing as she turns and exits through the curtain. Santana doesn't realize how tense she is until she releases the breath she's holding. Her muscles relax and suddenly she aches all over. With a groan she rolls to her side, throwing an arm over her eyes to block out the light of the school.

_Santana's mom hates her stepmom (which is to be expected) and often says disparagingly things about her before and after every weekend visit. But at fourteen years old Santana now grudgingly admits that Dawn might be kind of, well… cool. In most ways she __**is**__ more like a big sister to Santana than a stepmother. On the weekends she spends at her dad's house in Lima Heights Dawn takes Santana shopping and to the movies and teaches her dance moves and dirty jokes. She's quick to share a beauty tip, and always tells San how pretty she's growing up to be. When Dawn is the first adult from her crowd to buy beer for Santana's middle school parties, she earns the nickname "Coolest. Stepmom. Ever." from all of her friends and Santana's (dad's) house becomes the place to be with Santana at its center, position secured as the #1 middle school party host. She finds that she really enjoys the power that accompanies popularity._

"_Remember, work the hips. Roll 'em, roll 'em. Strut. Yes! Now smile. Shoulder, shoulder, hair toss. Smile again. Cock your chin. Eyebrow. Nice Santana! Totally hot." _

_Dawn is teaching her some moves for her upcoming Cheerios try-outs. She and Brittany have been working out the dance steps all summer, but Dawn's teaching her a little extra "panache" she calls it, that she assures Santana will definitely catch the judge's eye._

"_You are so gonna get in, San." she says, handing Santana a towel. "Just remember, stay relaxed and let your body flow with the music. You're a total natural at this."_

"_Well, it is in my blood. My mom was a Cheerio too, you know."_

"_Yeah, you definitely inherited her talent. Her good looks too. Don't worry, you'll for sure to make the team, and before you know it, you'll be the most popular girl in school. HBIC, baby: Head Bitch in Charge. The girls'll copy your every move and the boys'll throw themselves at your feet."_

"_I dunno about that. I'm not even sure I want a boyfriend. I mean, I'm kinda already seeing Puck and he's okay, but he's not my boyfriend." She air quotes it to make sure Dawn understands. "And I really would rather just be hanging out with B." Santana blushes, suddenly nervous. She rubs the towel over her face hoping it will mask any signs of embarrassment. She doesn't want anyone to know that "hanging out" with Brittany now includes a lot less homework, music and gossip, and a lot more kissing on Brittany's bed. Kissing with tongue._

"_Well then, let me give you one more piece of advice little miss soon-to-be McKinley-High's-hottest-new-Cheerio. Are you ready? Here it is: Sex is not dating."_

_Santana stares at her, a little shocked that maybe she just read her mind and now knows everything about her kissing Brittany._

"_W-what?" she stammers._

"_Sex. Is not. Dating. It means that you can fool around with all the boys you want, and trust me, you'll have plenty of opportunity for that, but until you give someone your heart, until you give someone your all, it's just fooling around. It's just sex. It doesn't have to mean anything. You understand?_

_Santana nods even though she's not exactly sure she does. It's embarrassing to talk about sex with any adult, much less this rather sexy adult version of a mom/sister, so she doesn't ask for clarification. She just rubs the towel over her face once more and asks, "Can we try it again? From the top?"_

_Because Dawn's kind of like a cool older sister who gives her advice and teaches her cool moves and buys her friends beer, Santana doesn't complain when she's the first to throw herself at San's father just walking thru the door after a long day at the hospital. She hugs and kisses him until he barks "enough" and stalks off to his study, Dawn on his heels, arms draped over his shoulders, and Santana, arms raised, welcome home hug unacknowledged, is left standing alone._

Santana really is asleep when she's woken by a feather light touch on her cheek. She startles awake, eyes flashing open to connect with the bluest eyes on the planet (or so she thinks) staring back at her from just inches away.

"God, Britt, you scared me." She places one hand over her heart and wants to place the other over her eyes but doesn't when she realizes this will impede her view of the blonde. Still, everything around her seems too bright and she instinctively grabs for her head, and in doing so, discovers that it doesn't hurt any more.

"Sorry San. I didn't mean to wake you. I just wanted to see if you were okay. I heard what happened."

Santana struggles to sit up and Brittany is right there helping her, an arm around her shoulders pulling her upright and sitting down next to her.

"Yeah, I'll bet. It's probably all over the school by now," Santana sighs. She really doesn't want to know what's being said about her, but feels like it's the only way she can do any kind of damage control. "What did you hear?"

"Just that Lauren threw you around in the hall a lot but that you fought her like a tiger," Brittany says lightly, her hand returning to caress Santana's cheek. "Are you okay?"

"Little sore, but don't tell anyone I said that. I'm waiting for my dad to pick me up."

Brittany nods and continues staring deeply into Santana's eyes and gently rubbing her cheek with her fingertips. Santana is quiet for a moment, looking back at her and suddenly realizes that for the first time all day, she feels at peace. Britt's fingertips are soft and gentle and feel so nice against her cheek that San closes her eyes and rests her head into Brittany's palm, a contented sigh escaping her lips. Brittany's thumb brushes those lips lightly and Santana practically moans at the touch.

"God, I've missed you B," she whispers, bringing her hand to her face to sandwich Brittany's hand against her cheek. "I've missed this. I miss us."

"I know San. I've missed you too." Brittany murmurs it so quietly, Santana's not sure if she actually heard it or just wished it.

Santana rests her head on Brittany's shoulder like she's done a million times before and Brittany extends her arm around the brunette's shoulders. She starts to gently rock them both, humming tunelessly under her breath. Santana closes her eyes again, content in the moment, and just drifts.

_Santana is fifteen years old as she marches into her dad's house and slams the door loudly behind her despite her father forbidding her "acting like an uncouth delinquent." She doesn't care if he hears her or even chastises her because right now she's pissed. She's one block past a heinous fight with Brittany and has stormed her way down the street in a red cloud of teenage fury. The loud dance music pumping from the great room tells Santana her dad's not home anyway, so she doesn't worry when she yells "I'm here!" knowing he forbids raised voices inside his house too._

_She gets no answer so drops her bag on the kitchen floor as she enters the room but stops short at the sight that meets her eyes. Dawn, clad in a bikini top and low rise boy shorts, is practicing her dance moves against a temporary metal pole that's been erected in the middle of the room. Santana stands frozen in the doorway, mouth agape, eyes fixed, as her half naked stepmother gyrates to a thumping bass line. She watches the sinewy legs clench and grip the pole and the large breasts bounce seductively as Dawn grinds her pelvis into the shiny metal. Blonde hair whips through the air and Santana feels her face heat up, a flush creeping from her cheeks all the way to her ears. She's even more shocked and embarrassed when she feels the rush of wet heat that floods her core as she stares at the dancer in front of her. A small squeak escapes her before she slaps a hand over her mouth and turns to flee the room. _

_She doesn't get far because she trips over her bag and goes sprawling on hands and face into the kitchen island, managing to take three barstools and a ceramic bowl of fruit to the ground with her._

"_Oh my god Santana, are you okay?" Dawn cries, running to her side._

"_Nothing! I mean no. I mean I-I tripped. I didn't mean to… I'm sorry I interrupted… I mean I didn't see anything." She's floundering and she knows it. But her body hurts and her face is on fire and she's scrambling to get up, to get out. Suddenly she can't breathe and her head feels heavy. She drops back down to the floor._

"_Are you hurt? Do you need an aspirin? Some water? " Dawn is running her hands over Santana's arms trying to comfort her, but the electric charge it creates causes Satana to flinch and heave sharply._

"_Wait. No, I'm fine. I'm okay. I just can't… STOP IT!" she cries a little too loudly._

_Dawn drops her hands, shocked. She sits back on her heels unaware that it is not the attempt to help with her injuries but rather her very small outfit and her previous actions that have Santana so flustered._

"_Do you want me to call your father?" _

_Santana gasps. "NO! Really, I'm fine. Look, I'll replace the bowl." She struggles to her feet, picks up the stools and places the fruit on the counter. "Tell dad he can take it out of my allowance."_

"_Please, San. You're father won't even miss that bowl. It's you I'm worried about. Are you sure you're okay?"_

"_Yeah, I'm fine, but I gotta go. Okay? I just… I gotta go." She grabs her bag and practically sprints out the door._

_Santana retreats back to Brittany's (who promptly forgives her for their earlier tiff) and leaves a voicemail for her father saying she can't make it that weekend, before turning her thoughts inward. It is easy to be contemplative around Brittany. The bubbly blonde is often off in a talkative little world of her own and Santana has plenty of time to think about what she has learned as she nods and "uh-huhs" along with Brittany's incessant commentary. _

_Santana is not naïve about sex. She's been making out first with Puck and then Brittany since middle school and the noises she hears coming from her mother's room leave very little to the imagination, but what shocks and horrifies her is not that her stepmother is probably a stripper (why else would she have that pole? And all the snide remarks her mother makes about Dawn suddenly click into place) but that she finds a nearly naked woman dancing against a pole highly erotic. It turns her on and that cannot be right. She is not gay! And this is her stepmother for fucks sake! What is wrong with her?_

_Thoughts and images swirl through her mind: Dawn wrapping herself provocatively around that pole, her own heated response, her mother's bitchy remarks, the constant parade of men through her mother's bedroom, the way her father eyes Dawn whenever he thinks Santana's not looking. Everything seems to blend together in her mind until she is such a jumble of overheated thoughts and feelings that the only way to calm her brain is for her to take Brittany to her large bed in her quiet room and not stop at second base like they usually do. The image of her own blue-eyed, blonde dancer grinding into her hips and coming underneath her that weekend becomes indelibly linked with the image of another blonde dancer thrusting against a brass pole in a house just down the street. _

_Later, she wonders if having sex with Brittany means she is turning into one of her parents but she can't decide which one; the one who lusts after hot, young, blonde dancers, or the one who is sleeping her way through the entire male population of Ohio in an effort to escape her miserable life. Much later, when her relationship with Brittany is so secure it doesn't matter what she thinks, Santana contemplates whether she might have been using Brittany that weekend. If so, to this day she's still not sure what exactly she was using her for._

Santana removes her arm from over her eyes as the school nurse pulls the curtain aside with a flourish and steps into view. She feels behind her for Brittany, missing the warm, comforting presence against her side immediately. She is alone. Brittany is gone, and her headache is back.

"I asked the hospital to have your father paged, but I haven't heard back yet. Do you want me to try your mother?"

Santana grimaces. She has no idea where her mother might be. She could be at work; although for the life of her Santana can't remember where her mother works these days. Jobs seem to flit in and out of her mother's life like men, neither lasting longer than the time it takes for her to find some fault with them. She quits, is fired, or sleeps with the wrong person, ending things badly every time. And that applies to both work and men.

"You can try her," Santana finally says. "I doubt she'll be available." And she leaves it at that, rolling over once again, her back to the nurse, to wonder when she'll be getting the hell out of this office.

The nurse closes the curtain quietly and retreats on silent crepe-soled shoes.

"_There will be some swelling so you won't get a true sense of the size until that goes down. I'd say two weeks at the minimum. Stitches come out in ten days and the scars will fade in about six months. If you feel well enough, you can go home this afternoon."_

_Santana nods numbly. She's sixteen years old and in too much pain to really listen, and at this point, she's not even sure why she went through with the operation to begin with. Her mother stands at her side, attentively listening to his instructions and even more attentively eyeing the young doctor while not so subtly pushing out her own D cups. She's still a beautiful woman; slender, hair dark and face unlined, and she has not lost her ability to attract a man. Santana watches groggily as her doctor's eyes lock onto her mother's breasts (San thinks he can probably tell her's are real) as he licks his lips. In that moment Santana is reminded of Finn Hudson in a seedy motel room and suddenly her doctor is nothing more than an awkward 16-year-old boy to her. She regrets ever having let either one of them touch her. A wave of nausea overtakes her and she grabs her mother's hand breaking the stares of the two adults standing above her._

"_Where's dad?" she mumbles. "Why hasn't he come to see me?"_

"_Um, actually, I think your father had another surgery to get to. I'll tell him you're awake though, okay?"_

"_Don't bother," her mother replies. "Just make sure the bill goes to his address."_

"_Of course, Mrs. Lopez."_

"_Please, call me Grace," her mother purrs, gripping his arm in a more than friendly manner. "I haven't been Mrs. Lopez for years."_

_That night Santana's not sure what's worse: The fact that she can barely take a breath because of the tight bandages, the fact that she must lie motionless on her back in her single bed, or the fact that she can't distinguish between the Percocet nightmares she's having and her mother's headboard pounding against her bedroom wall._

The next time the curtain is pulled back it is done so tentatively, quietly, and by inches. Santana turns her head wondering if it is finally a parent come to rescue her from the boredom of her present situation. It is not. What, or rather who, she sees peering at her through the curtain's divide is not a welcome sight. Her stomach tenses, her teeth gnash, and her fists clench. She growls loudly in preparation for her second fight of the day.

"Come to insult me again? Come to kick me while I'm down?"

Rachel Berry steps tentatively into the room.

"Santana, I've merely come to ascertain how you are feeling. As I'm sure you're aware, the news of your exploits has traveled widely throughout the school. As it's captain, it's important to me that all of the members of Glee Club remain in excellent health so that we may compete to the best of our ability." The quiet words leave Rachel's mouth in a nervous rush.

"Oh, so it's the Glee Club that you are worried about then, not me?" Santana sneers. "Did you 'ascertain' if Lauren was okay too? She's a member."

"I believe she is fine," Rachel says, taking a step toward Santana. "I saw her lifting weights in gym class and she may have mentioned something about her ability to bench press more than the weight of one scrawny ex-Cheerio. Or something like that." Again Rachel's speech is quick and Santana relaxes her fists and jaw, knowing that at least she still has the ability to make one person nervous.

"Well, you can rest assured that I am fine. I'll be back to Glee in no time, no harm done to the club whatsoever. So, you can go now." She flips her wrist at Berry as she throws an arm over her eyes to signal that she is done with the conversation.

But Rachel doesn't leave, instead taking another step toward Santana and continuing hesitantly, "Santana, I-I think that you're hurting."

"I'm not hurt. I'm fine. A couple knocks from that beached whale can't take me down."

"That's not what I mean, although I don't discount that getting thrown into lockers by a girl who is admittedly _much_ larger than you will definitely leave some bruises."

"Cheerios don't bruise. It's one of Sue's requirements," Santana grunts, still not looking at Rachel. _Why won't she leave?_

"I think that you're hurting from what I said in Glee Club the other day. What we all said. I'm sorry Santana, you're not really a bitch."

"Yes I am," Santana sighs, exasperated. "It's something I pride myself on."

"Well, maybe you want to be. You certainly put on that façade. But maybe you just have to act heartless and tough to, uhm, get by, your know, in your neighborhood…"

Santana leaps from the cot interrupting Rachel, her fists once again clenched, her eyes on fire. Rachel backs hurriedly away, her hands rising to protect her face, a quiet squeal escaping her lips.

"What did you say?" Santana hisses through a clenched jaw.

Rachel's voice raises an octave, "I just, I heard what you said about where you live and uhm… well, I know it's not a very nice part of town. And, I uhm… assumed that…"

Santana doesn't let her finish as she advances on Rachel grabbing the front of her argyle sweater in her fists and pulling the smaller girl toward her. Rachel gulps and closes her eyes anticipating pain. It feels good to intimidate someone and right now, Santana really wants to hurt the girl. She feels her muscles contract in preparation for the blow, feels the adrenaline course through her veins, but as her every synapse clenches another wave of dizziness rushes over her and she stops, grimacing with pain, and untangles her hands from Rachel's sweater, bringing them to cradle her head instead.

Rachel's eyes open abruptly. "Santana, what's wrong?" She can't deny the irony that _not_ getting hit means something's wrong, but in Rachel's world verbal, physical and slushie attacks are the norm.

"Just fuck off, Berry." Santana slumps back down on the cot, her head in her hands, knees drawn to her chest, her body curling inward to stave off the pain in her head.

"Santana, I know you don't mean it. I know you don't mean to be a bitch. I know that's not how you are on the inside."

"I said, 'Fuck. Off!' You don't know shit, Berry. So stop trying to psychoanalyze me. In fact, you don't even get to talk to me. Not after what you..." her voice trails off in a huff of breath. Santana wants so badly to throttle Rachel, to throw a punch, knee a stomach, anything to make her Just Stop Talking, but she finds herself suddenly too exhausted, too sore, and too empty to care about the smaller girl's presence at all. So she rolls over, her body still curled, and ignores her, willing blackness to wash over her again and take this day away.

Rachel stares at Santana's back curiously until the rhythmic contracting and expanding of ribs tells her that Santana has fallen asleep. She shakes her head sadly and tiptoes out of the room.

"_The truth is Santana, you can dish it out, but you can't take it. Okay, maybe you're right, maybe I am destined to play the title role in the Broadway musical version of Willow, but the only job you're going to have is working on a pole."_

_Santana is seventeen years old when Rachel Berry (of all fucking people) insinuates, in front of the entire Glee Club no less, that Santana's future lies in stripping, and she storms out of the room, humiliated and in tears. Brittany is there to comfort her as she breaks down in the hallway (something she hates herself for because she doesn't want anyone, especially Berry, to think that words can hurt her-She is Santana Lopez, __**nothing**__ can hurt her!) But as she sobs, Britt's comforting hand running through her hair, she realizes that Santana Lopez doesn't have much to show for herself these days. She's no longer a Cheerio, her best (and only) friend scarcely talks to her, and even Glee Club, which she once considered her refuge, is no longer the safe and friendly place it once was. She's still just a girl from the wrong side of the tracks with nothing to show for herself but a bad attitude and no way out. It's then that she realizes that it actually hurts to be Santana Lopez, it really fucking hurts. And maybe she doesn't want to be her any more._

The final bell rings waking Santana again. She is groggy and sore, both her body and mind cramped from her day spent on the hard, narrow cot. She just wants to escape this place. She wants to be anywhere but on a cot in a nurse's office at McKinley high brooding on the many wounds she's incurred lately.

Since the school day is over and she wants to go home too, the nurse releases Santana telling her that under no circumstances is she allowed to drive, and that she must bring a note from one of her parents to school tomorrow before she's allowed to attend her classes. Oh, and she also has an appointment with both Principal Figgins and Emma whats-her-face, the guidance counselor, to discuss her punishment for fighting. Great.

Santana waits until the halls are empty before exiting the nurse's office. She does not want any more hallway encounters this afternoon. She makes a quick stop at her locker to stow her books (she's not even thinking about doing homework tonight) and makes her way to the parking lot to retrieve her car. She drives straight to her father's house smirking as she passes through the pretentious scrolled metal gates of Lima Heights. She stops in front of the large, luxurious house and looks at it's dark exterior. No one is home. Her father never called back. Does he even know what happened? Does he even care?

She thinks about her father, who despite paying for Santana's car, clothes, braces and new D cups, still barely acknowledges her existence, and knows that the only attention he will give her is in the form of a lecture on the expectations of the behavior of a "daughter of his." Another yelling match about how she is turning out just like her mother is not something that Santana has the energy for tonight. She knows that, once again, she won't have the courage to challenge him and ask just whose fault that is. Not tonight, and maybe not ever. When he gets wind of her latest escapade he may even go through with his threat to "cut her off." Worse, he may just shake his head and disappear into his study instead with nothing said at all, the disappointment palpable on him. Santana doesn't want to be around for that.

She thinks about Dawn, and wonders if she might be available just to talk. If anyone is going to be there for her now, it's Dawn. Dawn who, despite not exactly being the best stepmother in the world, might ultimately be her only other ally besides Brittany. And unlike Brittany, she might actually comprehend Rachel's pole comment and sympathesize. But she knows she can never admit to Dawn what she suspects about her profession. Santana still hasn't actually seen Dawn stripping, but she's seen enough movies to have a pretty good idea what that would look like and she wonders if she is "at work". She imagines Dawn grinding her hips against a shiny brass pole; breasts shimmying and sequined g-string bottoms feathered with sweaty dollar bills and Santana wonders why she does it. She already has the nice house, the nice car, and the rich husband who adores her. She's made it. Why would she need to take her clothes off for money when she already has everything a girl could want?

Santana shakes her head uncomprehendingly and continues on, slowly driving back through the gates of Lima Heights and on to her own neighborhood, a half mile away. As she drives, she thinks about her mother, who despite all of her "efforts" still hasn't found a new husband, a new house or a new life. Their credit scores seem to weed the men out after only a few dates and five years later Grace seems more entrenched than ever in the depressing little house she swore to Santana was only temporary. "Til we get back on our feet," she'd said and Santana wonders what exactly that's going to take. "Feet-getting" seems to elude her mother just as much as jobs and men and, Santana cringes to think it, maybe even mothering. Santana sighs, her mother never called back either. Where is she? Who is she with? Santana expects she will arrive home to an empty house.

As she enters Lima Heights Adjacent she looks around and sees the graffiti and the grime, the boarded up windows and the many FOR SALE signs. She thinks about the hard but haunted looks of the girls her own age on the street and wonders just how different from them she really is. She lives her too and her fate is maybe no more certain than theirs. All this time she thought she was better than them because her father was a doctor, because she even had a father, that her time in L.H.A. was temporary. But what if a rich daddy in the suburbs isn't going to be enough to pave her way out? What did her mother tell her when she was twelve? Do whatever it takes to escape? Whatever it takes.

Santana parks in front of her rundown, dingy house and takes a good look at it. The miserable little rambler has peeling siding, bars on the window, a weedy yard and cracked sidewalks. It has one bathroom that she and her mother argue over daily and her own tiny bedroom has peeling wallpaper and paper-thin walls. Looking it over, Santana thinks about what it will take for her to get out of this house. This neighborhood. To get all the way out of Lima fucking Ohio. And she thinks that while it stings, maybe Rachel's prediction isn't so far off the mark.

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